The Rays announced that they have exercised their club option on infielder Brandon Lowe. Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times relayed the news on X prior to the official announcement. The club could have given Lowe a $1MM buyout and sent him to free agency but have instead locked in his $10.5MM salary for the upcoming season.
There wasn’t much suspense with this decision. Lowe has hit .245/.330/.482 in his career for a 126 wRC+. That includes a .244/.311/.473 line in 2024 for a 123 wRC+.
He has mostly played second base in his career but has also spent some time at first base and in the outfield corners. He’s not considered especially strong at any of those spots but the versatility is still useful. He has missed plenty of time due to injuries in his career, only once getting into 110 games in a season, but his production has been strong whenever he’s been out there.
Back in March of 2019, when Lowe had just 43 MLB games on his ledger, he and the Rays agreed to a six-year, $24MM contract extension. The Rays are undoubtedly happy with their return on that investment, given Lowe’s performance.
They have triggered the club option to keep Lowe around for 2025 and his contract has another club option for 2026. He can be retained for that season at a rate of $11.5MM with a $500K buyout.
The question now is if the Rays will hold him or trade him. The franchise often trades players as they get more expensive and closer to free agency, which applies to Lowe.
According to RosterResource, the projected 2025 payroll is fairly similar to what they paid in 2024. A few non-tenders of their arbitration-eligible players could give them some breathing space but they are also facing the uncertainty of their stadium situation. With Tropicana Field badly damaged by Hurricane Milton, it’s possible that the club has to spend the upcoming season or seasons as nomads. That could have financial implications in terms of ticket sales, refunds, repairs and so on.
Even if that situation is largely resolved by insurance or other means, the Rays normally keep payroll down by trading players in this situation for younger, cheaper and more controllable alternatives. As such, it wouldn’t be a surprise if Lowe’s name pops up in trade rumors this winter.
Mariner.
Future angel they need a second baseman. Potentially
You dont think Moore is the team’s future 2nd baseman?
@kellin I do. But I want the angels to trade rengifo. It’s probably redundant, but depends on the price. Sometimes the rays just dump because salary issues. They both could play third.
I’d like them to keep Rengifo, but I can absolutely see them trading him. Only thing I ask is any position players bring back some kind of decent pitching.
@kelllin we might be alright with pitching with this last draft. I’m thinking we might need outfielders.
As much as I love Nico Hoerner you can have him, Cam Sanders, and Brennan Davis for Logan O’Hoppe
@rex yeah, I can see this. Soler isn’t a great outfielder. We still don’t know what we’ll get out of Trout. Will Ward stay or be traded? Moniak is iffy. I still think Adell turned a corner and fixed his swing so he’ll be more like he was in April and August. I just question why it took so long for him to figure out what he was doing in April is what he should have kept doing. Johnny Washington failing at his job.
The Rays had a chance to win a championship a few years ago and now once again like last Off-season it’s time to unload some players. The Franco incident was unfortunate because he was someone the Ray’s were willing to spend big on
Didn’t they give him like 185mil over like 11 years or something like that? It’s obviously been voided now after what had happened. Which is a shame he was an all star in the making and probably a future Dodger 5 years into the contract.
The Rays will probably be very dormant in the offseason until they find out where they’re playing. Since that almost certainly won’t be Tropicana Field, I would expect a cut in payroll and possible trades of the more expensive players (which at this point is basically just Lowe and Diaz). Is this wishcasting so the Yankees can acquire one of them? Probably, but Tampa Bay is definitely an intriguing team in their soft rebuild.
I don’t think they really need to cut payroll. It’s pretty low as is. I do think they’ll move guys for right returns that may reduce payroll but they’ll be putting a competitive team on the field as a top priority. I think they keep Diaz and Lowe and build around them. They got the pitching to compete for a wc spot
Soft rebuild.
That’s the Rays every year. And about to be StL
Brandon Lowe makes me hate Christmas